


The Line Between Genius and Insanity

by toomanyfandoms



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera - Gaston Leroux, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Crossover, Here be masks, Here be slash, I SHIP JOHNLOCK, Lots of chapters, M/M, My First Fanfic, Mycroft may make an appearance, STILL IN PROGRESS, Sorry for all my musical jargon, There may be angst, There will definitely be fluff, but then you already knew that, hopefully
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-21
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-30 00:04:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/693062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toomanyfandoms/pseuds/toomanyfandoms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Hamish Watson is the "Christine", the young ingenue ballet dancer. An ominous presence has been noticed around the Paris Opera recently, but John doesn't connect that with Sherlock Holmes, his teacher and guide. There will be cases to solve and intrigue will abound! Rated T because these are murder mysteries- non-nasty, though. Thanks to my friend Maria for the title.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prelude

John Watson stumbled into the men's changing room and collapsed into a chair. It had been a marathon thirteen-hour dance practice today, in preparation for the upcoming premiere of some new, mysterious work by a new, mysterious composer.

 _It'll probably be uninteresting or dull,_ thought John, _and all this hard work, all the late nights of extra practice with Madame Giry just to get by, they will all be unnecessary and "unimportant" because no one will come to see this new opera. It's about a cuckolded old man! How many **hundreds** of times has that motif been repeated? There is the cuckold, the young pretty wife, the handsome young lover, etc., etc. Variations on a theme._

He sighed, watching the other five male dancers file in silently. _Well, at least there's a great ballet and nice music, or so it seems from the rehearsal piano. I shouldn't be depressed- I'm living my dream as a ballet dancer at the National Acadamy of Music, in Paris, and the people here are good, and…._

"John Hamish Watson!" The strident tones of Madame Giry cut into John's thoughts and roughly shook him out of his daydreams.

"What is wrong with you today? Your mind is off in the clouds while your feet are who knows where! There was no connection! You were not paying attention to anything you were doing!"

John knew she was right- he had often felt that his mind and his feet were in different places, especially today. Because today was the anniversary of….

His father's….

No, he wouldn't think of it. He'd put it off until tonight, when he would have nightmares about it and cry silently into his thin pillow, biting his knuckles to stop the sound. And then he'd finally fall back asleep, simply to repeat the process a few hours later. But not now. He wouldn't. Now, he'd focus on Madame Giry's voice and her harsh, but truthful words.

"Come with me, John," she commanded, pointing towards the hallway. He miserably followed her outside and shook his head when she asked him if anything was wrong.

"Well then, more lessons tonight it is. Meet me onstage at 6:00. Is that clear? And in the meantime, get some rest, John. You are looking rather pale and tired."

He agreed to do so, simply to get her to leave. She couldn't know that if he went to sleep, it would get worse, because when he slept, he dreamed.


	2. Una furtiva lagrima

After changing from his dance clothes, he wandered around the opera house for a while, puttering around until six. He eavesdropped at his secret listening spot and smiled at Carlotta’s (the leading soprano’s) usual shrill demands of the manager for more money, more prestige, a better role, and laughed at the mangers' polite bluster in return. He made light chatter to the young, giggly ballet girls, including the very pretty but very vague Christine. He stared up and down mysterious stairways and hallways, wondering about the rumors of the opera ghost. He tried on various wigs and false mustaches and gossiped with the wigroom attendants. 

Finally, it was six o’clock and he stepped onstage, feeling marginally better. 

No one greeted him, however; the empty room echoed back his steps with no hint of Madame Giry's strident tones. He sat down on the edge of the vast stage to wait for her arrival, idly swinging his legs.  
_Where is she? She **did** say six o’clock?_ He pulled out his father’s old, battered, cheap fob watch from his bundle of belongings on the corner of the stage. Yes, six o’clock, on the dot, it certainly was. 

He smiled weakly as he remembered his father’s great pride at buying the watch, though even then it had been old-fashioned and second-hand. It had been when they were touring the countryside of their native England, his father playing the violin while John danced (and sang), that he had purchased it from an old farmer who could no longer discern the numbers. Papa Watson wore it every day after that and constantly used it, even when it became more battered through their travels and the numbers were nearly hidden behind a scratched and rather dirty cover, even when they left England for France with the Valerius’ and he no longer needed an old timepiece because the Valerius house always had a clock, even when the coughing started, even when he died. John kept it on him and used it through medical school, even though there were more accurate timepieces scattered throughout the (repugnant) college for the students’ use. It was a small part of his father that John had been able to keep and now he wore it everywhere, almost as a salute to his father. 

_If I stare at the watch any longer, I might just cry._

_SO! Get up, practice your dance yet again until Madame Giry comes, and don’t think. That’s the ticket!!_

Standing up, he busily brushed off his shirt and “accidentally” wiped something off his face that certainly wasn’t a tear, probably just some dust or dirt. 

He stretched his legs, merely as a formality and a nod to the still absent Madame Giry. He was still limber from the long practice today, but it had been drilled into his head that you _always_ stretched before you started dancing. 

Now ready, he stood. 

He took a breath. 

He checked the stage to see if Madame Giry was there yet. 

He looked for his bundle of possessions to make sure they were out of his way. 

He scanned the deserted stage and seats once again, just to make sure no one was watching. 

In short, John Watson did everything he could to not have to start dancing.

It was not that John hated ballet; oh no, it was much more subtle than that. He loved the music and the harmonies, but he hated the punishing routine he was forced to undergo every day just to keep both his muscle tone and his flexibility. He loathed the structured way of doing things: there was no room for improvisation or personality. In fact, that was why he had loathed medical school and the military, even though he had stayed with both of them until he was forced out of one and got his doctorate in the other. He despised how dancing had become more than something he liked to do for amusement and relaxation and had now taken over his life. He could not do anything, could not treat himself after a hard performance to a warm cup of English tea and a pastry, could not collapse onto his bed in the tiny room after a tough rehearsal, could not dance to any other type of music, without thinking “What if this hurts my ballet?”

If he were honest with himself, he would admit that he most enjoyed (and was best at dancing) the folk dances he had learned as a child on his travels with his father. When he danced to those wild, free, almost pagan dances, he felt freedom that appealed to a part of him he usually kept hidden. But soon enough, the solid, respectable John came back and told him _No._

_No, don’t dance to these melodies, John, because you might get confused when you “really” dance. Don’t, because that feeling of freedom is wrong. Don’t, because that isn’t real dancing; real dancing is pain and sweat and long hours and stretching and **ronds de jambs** and **pirouettes** and Madame Giry pounding out the beat on the hard wooden floor of the stage and yelling, not freedom and laughter and lightness and no rules. Don’t, because you’re not good enough: if you can barely dance ballet, how can you **possibly** do this?_

Don’t sing either, though it gives you the same feeling of lightness and freedom. People might hear you and your ignorant mistakes and judge you. People might look at you with their eyes of soft, smooth silk barely concealing the frigid hard steel underneath and though they’d say “Well done, John! We never knew you could do this! Why haven’t you done this earlier?”, they would not mean it. What they would really mean was “Why **haven’t** you done this earlier? Were you afraid? Did you make mistakes, like you just did in front of us? You aren’t a famous tenor, though you foolishly dream about it. You are simply a middling ballet dancer.”

So John hid in the solid, respectable part of himself and didn’t dance his wild folk dances or sing in public. They were too far removed from the artificial and catty world of Firmin Richard, the cantankerous but musical, and Armand Moncharmin, the tasteless but jovial, the Opera's managers. Here, the “tasteless” sometimes won, especially in the ballet scenes, or so it seemed to John.

But when he was alone, in moments like these, he could escape and sing the operas like they were meant to be sung. He’d sing in the hallways, after checking both ends to make sure no-one was coming. He’d sing in the deserted changing room. When he sang, he could be free. One could express so much with just small differences: a trill here, a slight scoop there, a held note. It felt more pure, this idea that someone could create beauty and harmony through themselves only, without a set, without costumes, without musicians.

And now, here it was; another beautiful, golden moment of silence and peace that John would break with something close to abandon. He took a different kind of breath, the kind that filled him up so he could empty himself, pour himself into song. And he sang.

_Una furtiva lagrima, negli ochi suoi spunto…_

_Shyly and slow a tear arose, Gleaming within her eye…_

All went well until about a third of the way through. This was the tricky part- Nemorino, or whomever was singing him, held an F natural, blasted through a large crescendo into the next measure with only an eight note rest’s time to breath, then vaulted up to an A flat and he could never manage to do that without either running out of breath or rushing the beat. To be able to breathe, he had to slow the tempo, but then the song dragged painfully slowly and the long note beforehand was too long for him; if he made the tempo faster, considering the long F, he had no time to breath and his magnificent A flat turned into a squeak. As the passage approached, he felt himself tense, and sure enough, he ran out of breath. 

“Turn the D into a sixteenth note,” a man’s voice commanded. 

Shocked, John wildly looked around the seemingly-empty stage and hall but he could see no one. 

“Who……!”

_No, that won't do at all. My voice cracked. Try again._

“Who are you? Where are you? How long have you been spying on me?” 

_Much better. Very steady. Seemingly unaffected._

The beautiful, condescending, golden voice replied, “I’ll answer your terribly simple questions in exactly the opposite order you asked. I have not been _spying_ on you- that’s considered terribly rude, or so I’m told. I was simply watching for mistakes, which you didn’t make until that complicated passage, I might add. I have been **observing** for approximately 15 minutes. It doesn’t matter where my body is- I can make my voice sound from anywhere. Ventriloquism, I’ve found, is a useful skill in deceiving others. And last, it doesn’t matter who I am. I can be a demon from hell. I can be a cuckolded husband. I can be a cat, meowing from underneath a table. I can be a world-class consulting detective, which I am, the only one, if I may bring that to your attention. I can be the most famous and accomplished violinist the world has ever known. Or I can be an angel, sent by your father.”

John leaped back and looked around wildly for the source of these penetrating words. “How on earth did you know that? Did someone tell you that?”

The man scoffed. “John Watson- do you mind if I shorten that to just ‘Watson’ in the future? Good, good. Watson, it’s so obvious that it took all of three and a half seconds to deduce, and that’s only because I’ve been up all night for the past two days and I’m tired. Here is a man who looks at an old, battered watch as if it is the most precious thing in the world, and yet is not poor enough for it to be his only ‘good’ accessory. And anyway, you take some pride in your appearance, so an old, rusty watch doesn’t suit your character.”

“It is _not_ rusty-” John attempted, but the man continued to pontificate, disregarding him completely and talking right over him.

“Sentiment, then? Most likely family, because you’re not married and probably don’t have one _particular_ ballet girl that you like. The most obvious choice is father, because it’s such a masculine design. One, however, mustn’t omit the possibility of a mother wearing **her** father’s watch and passing it on to her son, but…. Balance of probabilities, what with the design and the fact that you are not destitute- Father, definitely. Is he dead or far away? You would be much more defensive if it was just a case of homesickness, because crying over Momma and Papa back on the farm is less masculine than crying because of a dead parent. Oh, incidentally, Afghanistan or Iraq? Afghanistan? Thought so. To a trained observer, you do not look the age you pretend to be. Oh, don’t worry, I will not ‘out’ you to the managers. So, a beloved dead musician father, an absent or dead mother, a tour in Afghanistan that resulted almost immediately in a shoulder wound and a psychosomatic limp that you try very hard to hide, medical training started in the French military but concluded in a school of prodigious repute, and great- I might even say starworthy- vocal talent but no way to bring it out. Did I miss anything?” he concluded triumphantly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Suddenly a long chapter appears!! I know, this came out of nowhere, but I wanted to introduced Sherlock, and I had this separated into 2 chapters, but..... Sherlock demands entrance! As always, comments would be much appreciated, especially if it's something I can fix. :)


	3. Continuo

“Wonderful!” John whispered quietly. Then, louder, “That was amazing! How do you do it?”

The man answered in an artificially bored voice that badly concealed his pride and happiness. “Commonplace, for me at least. That’s how my mind works. I can’t explain all my methods- it would take too long. If you were asked to prove that two and two made four, you might find some difficulty, and yet you are quite sure of the fact. So am I sure that you should be a great star, but you have locked your talent away inside of you since your father died. Madame Giry, honorable woman that she is, can’t see that and thus doesn’t cater her teachings to serve you. You could be great in anything you chose, including ballet, but I can see that you have poured your heart into singing. And healing others. But, unlike most of the civilized world, you regard that as the hobby and singing as the career. You need someone who can help. I can fill that gap. I will be your teacher.”

“But… But Madame Giry… She… She was… Six o’clock…,” John spluttered, while his mind worked furiously. 

“Madame Giry is at home with a small case of a very curable but incapacitating strain of stomach flu and won’t be with us today.”

“Well, that’s lucky for you, I suppose.”

He chuckled darkly. “I make my own luck.”

John looked up, horrified. “Did you… I mean, you… Drugged Madame Giry?!”

“As I said, she will recover from it in two days. It’s nothing she can’t handle and she is in no pain. She is used to such things, from me at least. And I did it for a good cause. You needed a teacher; I can help you with that. All arrogance aside, I am one of the premier experts on vocal training in France and perhaps in the world. So, you get a teacher, I get a cure for my insufferable and incessant boredom, we both win.”

John swallowed. “Agreed. But you can’t drug Madame Giry any more, no matter how much she’s used to it.”

He could practically hear the petulant scowl in the other man’s voice as he agreed, reluctantly.

“Good. Where shall we start? Oh, incidentally, what should I call you?” John asked.

There was a pause, then the man’s voice came back in an attempt at casualness. “Call me whatever you like- none of them will be my true name anyway. I suppose, when I interacted with men more, they called me Sherlock Holmes. Will that do?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nope, no excuse for being a lazy authoress! I guess I've been busy lately- what do you all say to updates on Sundays or Saturdays? :) Thanks and enjoy!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you'll believe it, this was originally 2 chapters! More musical jargon, and I used some book Sherlock dialogue almost verbatim. Enjoy!

John smiled. _Sherlock. A good name. Simultaneously extremely odd and melodious. Like him._

“So, um… How do you want to… That is… When do we start?”

Sherlock’s voice had a smile in it. “We start now. Do the passage again, but like I said, cut off the "D" and turn it into a sixteenth note instead of an eighth. You may have heard Ubaldo Piangi “sing” it straight through- that is, blast away at a perfectly good piece of music until there’s nothing left of the composer’s vision- but his voice is different from yours. This way is better for you and it sounds more natural. And no, you may not teach it to the other men of the ballet or the chorus. If they cannot find the way to do this on their own or by watching you, they don’t deserve to know.”

As he saw John hesitate, he added, “Just try it. I’m right, you know.”

John went to center stage and took a deep breath from his diaphragm, hearing the notes of the music in his head, only to realize that Sherlock was accompanying him on the violin. Apparently, he hadn’t been lying when he’d said that he was the best in the world- he transformed the simple chords of the aria into a masterpiece, adding vibrato and crescendos to signal an increase in volume to John, and adding notes where they were needed. John realized that a great portion of the song had flown by, and he had not only sung his best ever, but he hadn’t thought about the difficult passage, hadn’t tensed when a particularly difficult or long note came, and most importantly, hadn’t once thought of his father. 

The passage approached, and John was relaxed. He cut off the D earlier than he had before, took a good breath, and the A floated out of him, gracefully and exactly like Sherlock had said it would. _It's easy now- why haven't I thought of it before?_

He felt a funny muscle move on his face, and realized he was smiling- no, not smiling, grinning, like he hadn’t in years. The rest of the song flew by and before he knew it, it was done.

“Much better. Do you believe me now, John?”

“Yes, I do. Not that I didn’t before, of course, but…” John trailed off and sighed. “Forget it. Well, thank you for the lesson. Should I be here, six o’clock tomorrow?” He hoped his voice sounded more confident than he felt. Usually, he was very good at hiding his emotions, but this man saw through all that, straight to what John really felt.

 _For heaven’s sake, I just met Sherlock 15 minutes ago! I've never even seen his face! And yet I trust him and very much want these lessons to continue._ He did not want to even begin to fathom the tangled cobweb of reasons why.

“Yes, I suppose we can’t continue like this all night.” Sherlock sighed. “And now that I’ve had a taste of something interesting, the boredom will return and become even more insufferable.”  
John sat down, unlacing his ballet shoes. 

“Incidentally, what is a consulting detective? Are you really the only one in the world?”

“Yes, of course I am. Who else has the knowledge or the inclination?”

John shot a quick glance upwards. The man hadn’t been so careful with his voice- for the past minute, it had been coming from one particular region of the theater- the section of private boxes on the grand-tier, next to the stage-box, on the left. In particular, it seemed to be emanating from Box 5. 

“What exactly does a consulting detective do?” he asked.

“Here in Paris, we have lots of government detectives and lots of private ones. When they are at fault, they come to me, and I manage to put them on the right scent. They lay all the evidence before me, and I am generally able, by the help of my knowledge of the history of crime, to set them straight. There is a strong family resemblance about misdeeds, and if you have all the details of a thousand at your fingertips, it is odd if you can’t unravel the thousand and first. Parisian detectives come to me when they get themselves into a fix, and other people come when they are in trouble about something and want a little enlightening. I listen to their story, they listen to my comments, and then I pocket my fee.”

John was surprised: he had expected only a perfunctory answer, but this was obviously something Sherlock was proud of and could talk about for hours. And he realized that he’d like that. Something about this man’s comments previously had indicated a kind of resentment against the world, like when he said he’d been “told” that spying was rude- it wasn’t an obvious sneer, but from him it seemed an insult at- 

_At whom? I didn’t know._

But now Sherlock seemed almost content, describing the various skills of his profession and the various ways in which he helped others. John wanted to hear more.

“Do you mean that without leaving your room you can unravel some tangle which others can't understand, though they've seen every detail for themselves?”

Sherlock snorted. “They do _not_ see every detail, thankfully for my pocketbook. I see the obvious flaws, the quite noticeable patterns that they miss, the rather apparent mistakes which a criminal nearly always makes, and for that they pay me and call me a genius. I see everything. I have a kind of intuition that way. In rare instances, a case turns up which is a little more complex. Then I have to go through the quite tedious process of sending death threats to the local constabulary to ensure they don’t touch anything before I bustle out there and see things with my own eyes.”

John was rather astonished. “Was that a joke? From the famous Consulting Detective, no less. I am honored to be the recepient of such a favor.”

Sherlock chuckled. John shivered- the sound of Sherlock’s laughter seemed to echo throughout the deserted theater, its golden tones winding around the columns and seats and immeasurably cheering it.

“Yes, it was a joke. Perhaps I shall make another, in due time.”

John smiled and shook his head. _This man is more pompous than the ballet girls!_

“Until tomorrow, then?” he said, almost reluctantly.


	5. Chapter 5

Sherlock sighed. “Yes, I suppose you do have to go. It is usually expected that the teacher wishes the student a safe journey home at the end of a lesson, so consider the sentiments duly expressed.”

“If you’re uncomfortable, don’t do it. I won’t expect it of you.”

Sherlock’s voice floated down from Box 5, sounding suspicious. “That is what many have assured me, but their words had little truth to them. I have found that assertions like that only serve to build resentment on the one party’s side until it explodes one day, and the relationship is terminated.”

“No, I’m serious, Sherlock. You’ve done a lot to make me feel comfortable; you didn’t have to play your violin while I sang, for instance. It’s only fair that I should repay you. I promise I’ll tell you if resentment should ever start to build. Fair enough?”

“Yes, I suppose it is.”

“Goodbye, Sherlock. Six o’clock tomorrow, here.”

“Yes, of course. I don’t know why you feel the need to keep repeating that- it will not change anything.”

But John knew. If he kept saying it over and over, out loud and in his head, it would be real and it wouldn’t be something he had imagined, and he could count on it as a settled thing, this daily appointment with Sherlock Holmes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I finally updated again, and all you get is a cruddy continuation chapter! The next few should be lots longer!


	6. Spirito

The next few lessons continued in the same manner: John would show up, pretending he hadn’t worked on his song that day, and Sherlock would pretend to not notice John’s abominable acting skills, and John would pretend not to notice Sherlock’s not-exactly-serious scorn, and Sherlock would pretend to be offended and call John an inattentive idiot. 

More importantly, they sang. Not only did they sing John’s Una furtive lagrima, they also sang new songs that they both pretended they just happened to come across in their previous days, when in reality they both spent an increasing amount of time in the Opera’s libraries looking for just the right piece to show the other. 

Sherlock played his violin for John and pretended to be disgusted by John’s lack of musical taste (John was always asking for the latest music hall song that he heard from some of the rougher members of the Opera), but secretly he was pleased. John enjoyed hearing the songs, but more so he enjoyed hearing the changes Sherlock made to the songs, the changes that inevitably changed them into a masterpiece. Once, when Sherlock was in a very good mood (he muttered cryptically “Murders, John! A whole spree of them!”), he played whatever John asked for an hour before they both noticed the time simultaneously. 

John learned a great deal more about what a consulting detective actually did: it was a subject that Sherlock adored discussing, and John was happy to oblige. He got to know the some of the Parisian detective inspectors by not-very-pleasant reputation and name. He found that his mysterious companion had written various monographs on wide-ranging topics under assorted pseudonyms, and when he did some research and found them, he was impressed by Sherlock’s attention (one might say obsession) to the things he cared about most. 

But there where idiosyncrasies, too; little things John noticed, like the fact that Sherlock never said goodbye or wished John a safe journey after that first lesson. And the fact that it had been nearly a week, and John still hadn’t seen Sherlock. All he knew of Sherlock was a beautiful man’s voice that emanated from Box 5: he didn’t even bother to throw his voice anymore but let it point specifically to his hiding spot.

Normally, he was so careful in all things. It almost seemed that he wanted to be found, discovered by John. But of course that was insanity, to think that normally- if not honest,than at least direct- Sherlock would play games with John, wasn’t it? 

And then there were the odd lapses- sometimes it seemed that Sherlock had been living under a building or something for his whole lifetime. His knowledge was so ample and his focus so minute on most things that when he had a deficiency, it stood all the greater for the contrast. What most surprised John was that Sherlock did not know of the Copernican Theory, in which the sun is the center of the solar system. That any civilized human being in the nineteenth century should not be aware that the earth travelled around the sun appeared to John to be such an extraordinary fact that he could hardly believe it.

But when John corrected him, Sherlock simply laughed a little at John’s appalled expression and replied politely, “Thank you, but now that I do know I will do my best to forget it.”  
“To forget it!” John spluttered.

“Yes, forget it- delete it completely from my already overstuffed mind. You see, I consider a brain to be like an empty attic, and as you learn new facts you begin to fill it. A fool takes in all the lumber of whatever kind he comes across, so the knowledge that might be useful to him becomes hidden or at best mixed up with a lot of other things. Now the skillful workman is very careful as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He has nothing except the tools that help him do his work, but of these he has a large assortment, organized perfectly. This little room does not have elastic walls, you know, so there will come a point where for every new fact you add you must forget something that you knew before. You can see why it is of the highest importance not to have the useless facts shoving out the useful ones.”

“But the Solar System! It’s not useless!” John protested.

“It is to me. You say we spin around the sun- if we went round the moon, or we all went spinning on a child’s merry-go-round around a purple star it would not make a centime of difference to me or to my work.”

John sighed and rolled his eyes into the stretching silence. It almost felt like anticipation, this silence from Sherlock, almost like he was daring John to keep arguing and thinking him ridiculous. 

“Well? What is your opinion of that?” Sherlock asked defiantly, with (John realized) a hint of fright. Was he scared of what John might say, of his ridicule, and so cloaking himself in arrogance to hide that? Or was that just John Watson reading too much into things, as usual? 

_It doesn’t matter either way,_ he reflected. _I’m going to treat the situation as if I’m right, as if there is more to his question than a simple request for information._

“Sherlock,” he said carefully, “It really doesn’t matter what you do in your mind; it’s your property, after all, not mine. You think of your brain as an attic with contents as lumber- if you thought of it as a great ball of popcorn or a massive chestnut tree spinning around a purple star it would not make a centime of difference to me. You see, I’ve always wondered what true madness was like, and here might be a wonderful chance to experience it firsthand; and anyway, we are standing in a building designed specifically to teach men and women how to wear tights well and how to lift their legs in the most aesthetically pleasing manner. If that’s not mad, I don’t know what is. It’s all fine here,” he ended with a smile. 

John could almost hear the smile in Sherlock’s voice as he continued their lesson that day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of this isn't mine, it's Doyle's. I'm going to be quoting a lot from Doyle in the upcoming chapters, so disclaimer: I don't own any of it! :)


	7. Vivace

After two weeks had passed, John could hear the difference in his own voice. There was a real change in him, simply from being with Sherlock. He could hit higher notes with more accuracy and more confidence, he could hold notes longer without cracking, he could have more freedom and therefore more lightness, more _fun_ with his singing. And he hadn’t seen Sherlock once in those two long weeks. If someone had told him a fortnight ago that a mysterious voice that claimed to be from his dead father would improve his voice and make him laugh, make him warm inside, make him feel, well, _happy_ and at home as he hadn’t in a while, he would have- not laughed, but more likely smiled sadly and said he couldn’t feel that way anymore. 

Really, the companionship and warmth he felt when he worked with Sherlock were worth ten times the singing lessons and were his main reason for showing up promptly at six every day, not that he would ever tell him that. Once, when John was feeling a little under the weather and had been coughing and feeling tired all day, he walked onstage to find a mug of his favorite tea (Earl Grey, nigh on impossible to find in Paris and bloody- no, he was French now, _extremely_ \- expensive when you could) steaming centerstage. It was prepared just the way John liked it- little milk, one sugar, tea bag left in for a bit longer than absolutely necessary. Sherlock kept quiet while John sat cross-legged on the stage and quietly sipped the drink with a feeling like nostalgia (without the sadness) or of returning to his bed after a long day of dance (without the painful muscles), and neither really mentioned it after that. (John’s cold cleared right up after that.)

And John could write, if not a novel, then at least an essay on what being a consulting detective meant. 

And yet he still had neither seen Sherlock nor the impact of his work until one day when he got to see both. He walked into the auditorium, a story on the tip of his tongue to tell to Sherlock that James, who danced next to him in a few scenes, had told him about a chorus girl and a society boy (a Vicomte, no less!) determined to marry her because of some incident about a scarf. He looked up to Box 5, where sometimes he would see a small light like a pipe that showed Sherlock was there and in a pliant, yielding, polite mood. That mood was one of his favorites, even if Sherlock seemed a bit removed, as if half of his brain was focusing on something else, because John could ask anything he wanted and Sherlock would answer. It had almost become a game between them: John would come in with a ridiculous question, either about life or about trivia within the opera house, and Sherlock would pretend to think for a moment before shooting out the correct answer with an almost bored cadence (but John knew he wasn’t bored; how he knew he couldn’t tell you, he just knew). No light today, sadly. John sighed and began unpacking his music. 

“Sherlock!” he called. “I heard a great new song I’d like to look at, if that’s alright with you!”

“No need to yell,” came a voice off to his left. “I’m right here, John.”

John flew away from the curtains and landed in a defensive crouch, only vaguely reliving the painful recollection of memories of his father teaching him that. His heart was beating double-time, although from the fright or from the normally baritone voice that pitched down on his name (his Christian name!), drawing it into an almost-three-syllable word, sending shivers down his spine, and- _no. Those thoughts are wrong. Stop._ He remembered his father and Leonardo and what had happened in America and, with an effort, tore his mind away from dark, mysterious figures and square jaws and broad shoulders and tugged it back to the present. 

Sherlock was speaking. John had the distinct impression (one he’d had many times before) that Sherlock could read minds. “I have a client coming at 7:15. Yes, this is where I meet them and talk to them. I would like you to stay here and see how my work suits you. In other words, would you like to assist me on this case?”  
John’s mouth dropped open. When he found the necessary connections in his brain to close it, he immediately opened it again to spew out a string of speech, mostly concerning how he would be honored to do so.

“Well, then, John Watson,” ( _that voice, shivers again, no, stop it John, it’s quite literally illegal to want that_ ) “I suppose it’s time for us to shake hands on this and formally form a partnership.”  
John watched with rapt attention as the curtains parted and a tall, masked ( _Masked? Only on one side of his face? Why?_ ), trim, handsome man strode out. Only a hint of hesitation just before exiting the shadows betrayed any nervousness (or maybe that was just John’s wishful, romantic thinking) as he walked towards John with the express (and expressed) purpose of meeting him, touching him ( _NO_ ), shaking his hand like the partners they were ( _better_ ). 

His grip was firm, his hands were warm, and his fingers were long and muscular from years of playing the violin. John let his gaze wander along Sherlock’s body ( _NO_ ) about Sherlock’s person in search of information ( _yes_ ) that would help him understand this mysterious man. Only after about a minute had passed of him simply staring in awe at Sherlock’s lithe form, his unconventional but surprisingly unobtrusive dark purple shirt, his black double-breasted cloak ( _A cloak? Indoors?_ ), his dark suit, his highly polished black shoes, did he realize that they were still holding hands. He quickly pulled his hand away with a huff of breath and looked away awkwardly. _Much easier to concentrate when not looking directly at him._

“So, I suppose we’re partners now, huh?” John said, then cursed himself silently for both stating the obvious, something Sherlock hated, and for allowing his mind to expand the word “partners” into a string of ( _illegal!_ ) images in his mind. He glanced back, met Sherlock’s eyes ( _a deep blue, very intelligent of course_ ), flinched away, continued talking hurriedly. 

“So what do I contribute? And when do we start?” _Another stupid question! He’d explicitly told me when we start- at 7:15!_ “And, er, are we going to have our lesson?” John tried very hard not to let his voice end on a plaintive uptick but his vocal cords got the best of him. 

_Oh well, Sherlock probably already knows I like our lessons a lot._

Sherlock blinked, breaking the penetrating and assessing gaze that had been focused intently on John alone. Then he smiled. “You contribute an extra brain, some firepower, and legitimacy.” John scoffed. “Yes, even you, a ballet dancer with little-to-no social standing, are more obviously morally implacable than I am, and that is visible even to those who don’t have my mind. Clients see me and immediately think I am hiding something, and though they are technically correct because of my mask, I’d prefer them to not have the vague impression that I am plotting nefarious doings or am a bit of a scam.”

“-But surely, when they hear you speak, when they hear you deduce, how can they doubt your legitimacy?”

“Watson, sometimes they take one look and decide I’m not worth the trouble of digging up a long-dead mystery that has been plaguing them. They usually come back after they realize there’s no one else, but by then whatever it was that turned their mind back on to the problem is gone and I have less of a chance of solving the case. Sometimes I just don’t allow them to see me- I’ll speak from Box 5 and advise them. I still have to convince them to trust me, but it can be less of a hassle than them actually seeing me. Back to you- we start after we have our lesson. Which means we start the lesson now.”

John’s mind stuttered at the knowledge that he was allowed to see Sherlock, that Sherlock trusted him enough to let him meet him face to face, that Sherlock was secure in the knowledge that he wouldn’t suspect him of “nefarious doings” upon sight. He stammered an acceptance and put his music on the stand. Suddenly, a warm hand was at the small of his back and another was placed on his right shoulder, causing him to start up and away. 

“There. That’s more like the correct posture. Your posture, John, is a very strange thing- when you’re tired, it’s abominable; when you’re stressed it’s perfect. You know, Piangi doesn’t _just_ stand incredibly straight because he’s insecure about his height, he stands that way because it’s easier to hit high notes like that. I thought a physical demonstration might help you remember the right way better than you remember my saying ‘Stand up straight’ 15 times so far.”

John blushed guiltily, both at Sherlock’s words and from the heat of his hand so close to- No. With a massive amount of self-control, he riveted his mind to the sheet music in front of him. When Sherlock’s hands were removed to play the starting note, John immediately felt cold. He unconsciously slumped a bit and as if in response Sherlock huffed and put them back, his left hand little lower this time. It stayed there for the entire lesson. John also noticed that Sherlock inched closer and closer, finally ending up with his chin lightly resting on the top of John’s head. ( _God, he's tall._ ) There was, of course, a good reason for each of the points of contact- Sherlock’s hands reinforced John’s posture, and how else could Sherlock see the music in front of John if he didn’t put his chin on John’s head? Somehow, these reasons seemed pretty flimsy to John.

These three points of heat sustained John through a rather punishing lesson, as John hadn’t had time to practice lately because of extra-long dance practices in preparation for the gala for the managers’ retirement. It was coming up in four weeks, and Sherlock almost seemed to be preparing John for it. John couldn’t fathom why he needed to practice Piangi’s part more than the other songs, but he could only assume that Sherlock had his own reasons.

He finished with _Una Furtiva Lagrima_ , and when that was over Sherlock moved away from John ( _reluctantly? No, it couldn’t be_ ) and said “I do believe that it is 7:00. Our client-” (John smiled internally at the use of ‘our’) “will be here any minute, likely thinking that by arriving 15 minutes early he is being polite, when he is in reality cutting into our valuable lesson time,” Sherlock scoffed.

John frowned. He’d been brought up to believe that if you weren’t 5 minutes early, you were late. Yes, 15 minutes could be a bit much, but still…

“Watson?” Sherlock queried, almost gently. “What is it? Human interaction is so complicated, and when I’m not on my guard I’m constantly making some awfully rude error. I’ve been told it was polite to arrive early, but I have also been to cultures where a more relaxed way of life is preferred and it is de rigoeur to arrive 15 minutes late. I say, why not arrive on time? Stop all this complicated social nonsense. I always arrive precisely when I say I will and I am continually disappointed when others don’t have the same respect for my time.”

John opened his mouth to explain that by arriving earlier, the assumption was that you were showing respect by getting the business concluded earlier and then leaving 15 minutes earlier. He shut it. He thought about it, and found that it was a ridiculous argument to be having, because no matter who was right, the man would be coming in about a minute anyway. He sighed and got back to packing away his music.


End file.
